literature without Lucretius, or a wine-glass of cold water.
When I look back and see him, more military than ecclesiastical (except for a snuffle) in his doctorial scarlet, I think that it was partly his brow that was his power. It was a calm, ample, antique brow. In the ancient world the brow made the man and the god. It was as divine as ægis or thunder or eagle. It was more magisterial than the fasces. It commanded the Consulate and troubled the dominion of Persia and cast down the power of Hannibal. The brow of Jupiter—of Plato—of Augustus—was a hill of majesty equal with Olympus. The history of old sculpture is an Ave! to the brow. Now the soul has descended to the eyes. In politics, war, literature, above all in finance, victory is with the eyes. The old man had the godlike span of curving bone; but his eyes slept. It was his good fortune and Oxford’s honour that he ruled an Oxford college.
IV
Among the younger men is one who spent perhaps a year in trying to combine high living and high thinking; then made a compromise by dropping the high thinking; and at last, perhaps as the result of some solemn intervention, became ascetic. He is a friend of authors and potentates. He understands a bishop, and takes a kindly interest in east-enders, so long as they are in Oxford. His aspect is grave and calm, since life, in losing half its vices, has lost all its charm. Like fine[Pg 214] cutlery, his manners lack nothing but originality; he has a good taste in flowers, and can even arrange them. Nor is the taste in books limited by his connoisseurship in binding. He is a free and fearless reader, yet careful in the choice of books to be left on the table. If style were finish, his writing would be famous; but his beautiful style is always subordinated to a really beautiful handwriting. His originally dilettante interest in palæography has lured him into some genuine research among old manuscripts. His lectures are therefore fresh, thoughtful, and perfect in gesture, delivery, and composition. I seem to behold Virgil himself at the end of one of his descants, or Politian at least. If he had not more love of the applause of his most graceful pupils than of the learned world, he might be renowned. But he is content to be three-quarters of a specialist in history and more than one of the arts, and to be a lodestar to the ladies of his audience. Perhaps only they can do him justice.
V
There is (or was) to be found at the top of a mouldy Oxford staircase the most unpedantic man in the world, seated underneath and upon and amidst innumerable books. In the more graceful than sufficient garments of his leisure, he looked like Homer, with hair still ungrizzled. He spoke, and back came the Iliad and the Odyssey on that stormy sound. But he could so well dissemble this physical magnificence that he passed in[Pg 216][Pg 215]
BISHOP KING’S HOUSE
The part of the house showing in this picture faces to the north; the east front, at right angles with this, being in St. Aldate’s. The white buildings at the left are on the east side of St. Aldate’s. It was built by Bishop King, the last Abbot of Osney and the first Bishop of Oxford. The front was rebuilt in 1628.